New Demon Lord Dante
New Demon Lord Dante (新魔王ダンテ, Shin Maō Dante), also published as simply Demon Lord Dante (魔王ダンテ, Maō Dante), is a 2002 Seinin action-horror manga by Go Nagai. It continues and retells parts of Nagai's unfinished Demon Lord Dante from different perspectives with additional and a few changed details. Story The story begins with an expanded account of God's attack on Soddom. Scientist couple Dante and Medusa are saved by their colleague Satan who takes them on his aircraft and go to their laboratory where they, along with their coworkers Beelzebub, Astaroth, Asmodeus, and Lucifer, Satan's sister, board weaponized aircraft's in order to fight God. Meanwhile God possesses and forcefully merges inhabitants of Soddom into two giant warriors, Adam and Eve, and outfits them with armour constructed from the wreckage of the city, before preceding to kill off the remaining inhabitants. Dante and the scientists arrive and take down Adam, but in the fight the fires of God merge them with their aircraft's, thus turning them into demons. The people freed from Adam are similarly turn into demons by the flames. The parts of God that inhabited them fly off and posses other creatures, creating angelic beings. The demons and the angelic beings go to war and ultimately it is down to Dante and Eve. At first it looks as if Dante has the upper hand, but when Dante breaks Eve's helmet he recognises his younger sister Olga in Eve's forehead. Eve seizes the opportunity to stab Dante and seal him inside the Himalayas. The story shifts to the time frame of the original series. Medusa and a group of Satanists led by Beelzebub are trying to use her psychic abilities to awaken the memories of Dante's reincarnation, Ryo Utsugi. Later Ryo witness a woman being assaulted by armed men. Ryo comes to her defence, but before a fight can break out the men's superior intervenes. The superior reveals himself to be Ryo's friend and kendo-teacher Sosuke Oshiba. During Ryo's next kendo-class Oshiba has the very same woman brought in by one of his underlings. Ryo is forced to watch as they brutally beat her. Eventually she transforms, revealing herself to be a demon, and Oshiba decapitates her. Later Oshiba take Ryo to the men's headquarters and they reveal themselves to be members of "Guardian Justice", a militant subsidiary of the secret organisation "Souls of God", tasked with finding and annihilating demons. Ryo eventually joins their cause. As Ryo continues to work with Guardian Justice he also meets and grows closer to Medusa's human persona, until one day Oshiba and his underlings arrive to capture her. Medusa tries to escape but is rendered unconscious by Archangel Metatron, head of "The Thirteen Apostles" the highest order of Souls of God. Medusa mentally contacts Sho and tells him of the Satanists plan to sacrifice his sister Aya in order to resurrect Dante's body. Ryo breaks into the Souls of God headquarters and frees Medusa. She flies him to the satanist's gathering where Ryo manage to save Aya, but is consumed by Dante in the process. Dante begins to destroy Tokyo in a confused and blood fueled rampage, but eventually Ryo regains consciousness. Ryo separates himself from Dante's aircraft, but still retains demonic qualities. As he flies away he comes across another demon named Zeno. Zeno who had sided with God attacks Dante with his Army of 100 demons. Dante defeats some of them but is eventually forced to escape. When Ryo returns home Aya reacts with shock seeing him alive. Footage is aired on TV showing Dante's rampage and detailing Ryo in Dante's forehead, forcing Ryo to run away and hide. Five years later Aya has become a high ranking member of God’s Army and much of the world has become devastated by the war between the angels and demons. Ryo hides out among the homeless population of Tokyo, but Zeno and his army arrive and start killing everyone. Ryo confronts Zeno and the two fight. Ryo re-merges with Dante's aircraft, regaining Dante's original demon form, and kills Zeno. The rest of Zeno's army are scattered as Medusa, Lucifer and Satan arrive. Together they help Dante regain his memories. At the same time Adam and Eve reform at the Souls of God headquarters. Aya is brought in and is revealed to be the reincarnation of Dante's sister Olga. Like her previous incarnation she is forced to become the centrepiece of Eve and placed into Eve's forehead. Archangel Metatron is placed into Adam's forehead. After this, all-out war erupts between demons and the God-aligned humans, but eventually just as what happened in Soddom, God leaves the humans to activate and utilise Adam and Eve against the demons. The demons defeat Adam and Dante manages to free Aya/Olga from Eve, causing her to collapse and crumble. Without Adam and Eve, God is defeated by the demons and leaves earth. Characters *Dante Luther: The leader of the Demon race, one of the first demons created after accidentally being created by God. He led a thousand year revolution against God but was eventually encased in ice, until he was eventually managed to split his human form up and subconsciously managed to get the two to reunite and eventually restarted his battle with God. *Medusa Gorgon: Dante's friend and former tutor. Medusa guides Dante through his transformation and rebirth in the era of modern man. *Olga Luther: Dante's beloved sister, he is incredibly protective of her defending her from demons, God's forces and thirsty classmates. She is later reincarnated into Aya Utsugi, where she ends up becoming a high ranking commander in God's military forces. In both lives she ends up as the main body of the creature known as Eve. *God: Unlike other versions, here God was an ancient alien deity that consisted of multiple forms who came to the Earth and attempted to wipe out the current civilisation, however in the process he accidentally creates the demon race. *Archangel Uriel: One of the alien bodies that made up God, he was a high ranking deity that would eventually father both Aya and Ryo. Even after learning about the true origins of his children he still loved him, his time on Earth having given him the ability to feel emotion. *Archangel Metatron: An extremely powerful Archangel, he appears multiple times throughout to cast misery over the demon race, using his powerful psychic ability to fight them. *Adam: One half of a pair of colossal titans, constructed from the bodies of humans forcefully fused together, whilst being fully conscious and aware to their situation. *Eve: The second part of the duo, the colossal woman has Olga/Aya centred in her forehead and is responsible for slaying Dante originally. *Sosuke Oshiba: Ryo's school friend and kendo champion. He was the leader of Guardian Justice, a group of anti-demon militants. *Zeno: A traitor that joined the forces of God. Once an ally of Dante, here he appears twice to cause chaos, happily killing his own kind in cold blood. *Beelzebub: One of Dante's old allies, he ends up becoming a key figure of authority during Dante's absence. *Satan: Dante's best friend, he ends up becoming a powerful demon entity fused with his sister Lucifer. *Lucifer: A former scientist in the city of Sodom, she and her brother eventually fuse creating a powerful psychic demon. *Vorak: The high ranking President of Hell, Vorak is a mighty demon and of the commanders in the demon army. Trivia *This is the only version of the story to give Dante a second name, in this case being Luther. *Many of the demons in the manga have their designs styled after classical goetic designs, this can be seen in Baal, Asmodeus, Astaroth and others. *Similarly, many of the Gods take influence from a broad range of different religious deities, such as Hinduism and Greek and Roman myth, as opposed to other versions that just reflect upon the Christian idea of God. *Zennon returns, but under the new name Zeno and has a lightly altered appearance. *Similar to the original Demon Lord Dante manga, a demon named Amon is mentioned but never actually appears. Category:Manga Category:Dynamic Productions Category:New Dante (Manga)